Afflicted to the Core, page 9
part #3 of Wielder World Series
"Let's go," Bethany said. "Happy reunion in the van."
"Did you get their phones? They have pictures of us on one," August said.
"Yes. We got everything but the take-out." She jerked her head and rushed out the door. The three men followed. August didn't give the place another glance.
Reggie paused by the slowly filling van, then followed his sister out to the road. "We're taking Kyle. Will follow you in the car."
"Fine. Don't lose us."
Kyle leaned heavily on Reggie as they took their time walking down the driveway and then along the shoulder of the empty highway to the car. August strode behind, ready to catch either if they stumbled. Reggie beeped his car unlocked. August yanked open the rear door, tossed Reggie's bag to the far side, and held the door open. Kyle slipped in, holding onto his head like a pecking bird might burst out. August climbed into the back seat with him, though the lack of legroom had him nearly chewing on his knees.
"I feel like shit." Kyle groaned. "Like day old shit. Day old shit sitting in the sun. Fuck me."
"August, get him some water, would you?" Reggie turned the engine over.
August fished out a bottle of water from the B&E bag and handed it to Kyle. Only one more left. "How about something to munch on?" August asked, digging around for a protein bar.
Kyle looked up at him, dirty hair brushed away from his forehead. In the oubliette, he'd had this dull look nesting in his eyes. Like the man's spirit had slowly been sanded away by inspirational posters and self-hate lectures. Now, although he looked like he'd been dragged around a circus arena behind a team of horses, that spark had returned. August wanted to cheer.
"No, not now. Thanks, though." Kyle smiled his gratitude, and August was reminded that he was in a car with two attractive friends and a persistent woody.
The van pulled onto the narrow country road, followed by Beth's car, another car, and then Reggie joined the procession, the caboose of the crazy train.
Kyle pressed up against August's side and leaned his head on his shoulder, seemed to sink into him like August offered every avenue of safety available. Instinct had August resting his hand on the side of Kyle's face, holding him, offering him the stability he so obviously needed. Poor kid. Kyle's body shook slightly, from the drugs, from repressed Taint, August wasn't sure. Either way, the kid was wrecked.
"Do we have to go with them?" Kyle asked.
"We should," Reggie said from the front seat, following his sister down the highway. "They'll find out what they were drugging you with." His eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror, meeting August's. Worry was splattered all over the planes of his face, though his voice remained steady. Professorial. "Sound good, Kyle?"
"Yeah, whatever. Just...don't leave me with them." Kyle swallowed. "Don't leave me."
"We won't," Reggie vowed. "We won't leave you. Ever."
Chapter 8
Reggie followed Bethany's car as it swung onto Morrison Street. The area was zoned a warehouse district, but in the last few years, urban gentrification had almost engulfed it within its property tax-hike embrace. Vaguely familiar, Reggie thought the Black Castle might be somewhere nearby. His sister pulled into a small three-car, unlit parking lot beside another dark sedan, the pavement cracked in places and uneven. The large building attached to the lot, similar to the ones on surrounding blocks, blended in with anonymous obscurity. The van was nowhere to be seen, probably stashed in some side alley or tucked inside the warehouse. Reggie pulled up along the street under one of the few streetlights and cut the engine.
He realized that he was shaking. With unleashed relief, he rested his forehead against the steering wheel, letting the day's events whoosh from his body with a trembling breath.
He'd lost Kyle, broken into a shady manor house guarded by Wielders who claimed to be sanctioned by the government, got captured, Wielded the Nerve himself, then found and rescued Kyle, only to be whisked away to a warehouse in Portman operated by who knows whom, though apparently, his sister did.
Her secret group, probably.
The victory, as real and tangible as Kyle in his back seat, still felt beyond his reach.
Exhaustion hit him. His eyes flicked to the clock on the dash, which was blank. Oh yeah, the car was off.
"How you two holding up?" he asked, finally shifting his attention from the dashboard to the men in his backseat.
Kyle groaned, a resigned note, and wiped drool off his chin, then looked at August in apology. "Sorry," he muttered, sitting up straight. "We're not at your digs. Where we at?"
"Don't really know. Some warehouse. In southeast. Come on, let's see what my sister's got planned."
They climbed out of the car. Reggie rolled his shoulders, trying to ignore the rub of his hip against his jeans those first few steps. His entire side felt morphed from the familiar, and he dreaded seeing the extent of this new Corruption. He just wouldn't undress. Ever. Keep the lights off when he showered. His unique disentangling power didn't spread his Corruption as much as his petrification power. He could disentangle for months for one inch of tortured flesh. Petrification---well, that one took its acreage of skin for each use.
August quirked up one eyebrow but didn't say anything. Reggie appreciated that. He didn't want to get into it, not with Kyle around.
Kyle looked incredibly young. Even younger than he had yesterday at Harpford's. Damn it, Reggie. He shook his head at himself. He was young, sure, but so strong.
Bethany waited for them by a metal warehouse door marked with a sign that read Employees Only. She was patting down her mussed hair, attempting to keep a neutral expression, but Reggie saw the tense line to her jaw. In his younger years, he would have done anything to avoid such a look, knowing it advertised that he'd earned a chewing out that would drag on until the young hours of the morning. Now, he understood the message all too well. The vexation. The worry.
They slipped inside, and without holding back, he hugged his sister desperately. "Thanks for helping."
Though smaller, his sister was fierce, and she gave as good as she got. "Shit, Reg, do not pull that crap again." She leaned back, hard eyes scanning his body, her face sickly pale in the feeble fluorescent lights beaming down on them from the warehouse rafters high overhead. She grumbled, "Sorry I couldn't just get him out of the center in the first place."
Reggie gritted his teeth. He completely understood.
They ended the hug. "So...this is the Coalition," she said with a shy shrug. "I'll introduce you later, but all the women have backgrounds in official agencies, and all have issues with how men are treated." Another quick hug and she turned to Kyle, offering him a weak smile. "Good to see you, kid. We've a doctor who wants to look you over." She cupped his elbow, and he let her pull him inside. Reggie followed, nearly tripping over his own feet, but August grabbed his biceps to steady him. They were all stretched thin, hurt, and flummoxed. Reggie had never been one for twenty-four-hour study marathons, preferring a full night's rest to let the knowledge sink in instead. Also, he could use a hot, steaming bath and a bed. The steam always loosened his rough hide.
Don't think about it, Reggie. Just don't.
The chill inside the huge space caused Reggie to wrap his arms around himself as he looked around, taking in the maze created by erected drywall partitions reaching about a foot and a half over his line of sight. The boys rescued from the manor gathered nearby in a loose pack. He caught sight of a woman whom Reggie recognized: Dr. Juanita Llewellyn.
"Dr. Llewellyn." He shook her hand heartily. After he'd been skinned alive by the Mara Murda scientist, she was the doctor who examined him. "So, you're part of this...." He spun around in place, arms out, taking in the make-shift walls, the meeting room, the open space above filled only with metal girders that gave him a sense of being vulnerable, watched.
"This vigilante group?" She gave him a tight smile. "Yes, well, I was recruited early into the Coalition. By the way, we're flying under the radar so please, no names if others are around." An eye flick to the boys was more than enough of a hint for Reggie to catch a clue. "Your sister said you were doing better." She gave him a professional scan. "Glad to see you fully recovered."
Reggie only nodded, wishing he knew more about this vigilante group his sister was enmeshed in.
Juanita turned towards the rescuees, crossing the short distance to where they'd gathered by a seating area with cheap, thin office carpet, a few office chairs with thin seat padding, and two long banquet tables; her brown eyes were flat with detachment as she seemed to classify and sort them in an instant. "All right boys, time to check you all out. Nee, you've the medical charts?"
Bethany hoisted a blue cloth bag. Juanita took the bag, and Bethany left down a walkway with a nod good-bye in Reggie's direction.
"Fun times. This should take a while," August said as he pulled Reggie away from Kyle. What they could see of the warehouse appeared sparsely furnished. In the large open space they waited in, Juanita's new patients took the few chairs with two left standing. A gaggle of young men, all dazed and lost. The doctor organized supplies and medical equipment into piles on one table. August and Reggie sat on the blue carpet, legs pulled up out of the way, directly across from where Kyle was sitting with the others. Kyle's eyes were half-lidded in exhaustion, but he gave them a small yet heartfelt smile.
Juanita ran the men through a full battery of tests. She took blood, blood pressure, saliva swabs, measured pupillary light response. Another woman had come in and brought a rolling frame draped with a security curtain. Juanita took the men behind it, one at a time, and examined them in privacy. When she took Kyle to the makeshift exam room, Reggie struggled against the desire to follow, pressing his forehead to his knees instead, trying to relax without giving in to the need to close his eyes and sleep.
"You okay?" August asked, his voice low and almost soporific.
Reggie shook his head against his knees. "Tired."
August patted Reggie on the shoulder, then stood. Reggie looked up, eyes blurry, watching as he walked down the same walkway Bethany had, probably looking for the toilet.
Less than ten minutes later, Kyle shuffled out. His attention immediately settled on Reggie, and he made his slow way over, lowering himself to the hard floor beside him to lean against Reggie's side. Juanita moved onto the next man in her methodical manner. August came in bearing paper plates of food and handed one to each man and Juanita. Most jumped at the offering.
When Reggie got his plate, it looked to be sandwiches...with no meat. He chuckled to himself and dug in. The lettuce crunched. At least August allowed the cheese. Also, some chips that tasted a little stale. One thing the Coalition's warehouse was not was a gourmet kitchen.
Juanita finally finished the last examination. "Well, I'll know more after I've had time to look everything over. We've places for you to stay." Juanita didn't appear too concerned as she gathered the data she'd collected and left for another part of the warehouse.
August stood again. "Why don't ya'll follow me. I saw them setting up a room for you." The men left their paper plates scattered over the tables and followed August out of the banquet room down a hall.
One of the men asked Reggie, "Where are we?"
"Don't know. Some warehouse in Portman. Where are you from?"
"Portman! Crap," the black guy said. "I'm from Spokane."
"Boise, here," said a young guy with bad teeth. "I was in Portman for a job interview."
The group of men followed August, each in their own thoughts. From their short walk through the huge building, Reggie realized the warehouse wasn't really set up to house survivors. For the most part, it stored automobiles, lab equipment, and computers. An office, with paper files as well as several servers, paralleled the lab room. There were sections for weapons, military gear, and medical paraphernalia. "Holy shit," one guy said. "Who are these ladies?" A small kitchen, a bathroom, a room with five beds and some storage trunks that reminded Reggie of a military barracks. Reggie's pulse rose as he cataloged each of the unexpected things.
She'd told him she was involved in a secret group. But this was bigger than she had let on.
His sister---the law-abiding, by the book, sister who had raised him---was a member of a secret organization working against the darker underbelly of the Bureau of Wielder Services. He knew this from their vague conversations...but he didn't know this. Didn't understand the scope of what that meant. It took a while for all this to soak in, but in a way, it made sense. She had always been dedicated to her job, but this, in addition to her official employment, explained her extra hours working and her broken marriage.
He wondered idly what they'd done to those women from the manor house. Though, honestly, he didn't really care.
A woman of unremarkable height and impeccable clothing, that Bethany had pointed out earlier as Jazzy Schmidt, stepped out into the halls. "I'm sure you're all anxious to contact your families, but it's best if you remain missing for now. We're not sure what the people who took you might do. You're welcome to stay here for a time." She offered a motherly smile, though she wasn't otherwise matronly. "We'll figure it out."
Jazzy led them into another room that had piles of boxes stacked to one side and a lineup of Army Navy cots that still had tags on them. She briefly met the eyes of another woman before she left. The other, a Brit with blondish hair and a square face named Melissa Cohen, was pulling out sleeping bags from plastic wrapping and tossing one on each cot.
Bethany arrived, dragging in a folding card table and a few chairs. Some of the men crashed on the cots, a few sat at the table. To Reggie's disquiet, August led Kyle to a cot. He settled Kyle down and draped the sleeping bag over him before he sat on the floor beside the cot, utilizing more grace than someone his size should employ. Always by his side, as he'd been in the back of the car on the way over, as he'd been at Mara Murda, like a guardian against evil dreams.
Kyle's complexion had gone from typical goth pale to sickly white; his eyes were large and somehow hollow. He stared at Reggie, and Reggie wished he could go to Kyle like August had. Guard him as well, but something had shifted, and he didn't understand it. Wasn't confident enough to act. Didn't understand what August was doing. Was he trying to stake some claim on the younger man, the man Reggie had finally let into his life just in time for bad circumstances to tear him away?
"This shall do for temporary sleeping arrangements," said Melissa, a soft British flavor to her voice. Reggie had never met her, hadn't even heard her mentioned, which shocked him since she and Bethany seemed fairly close.
"We need to figure out where to send them," Bethany said, tossing Melissa a sleeping bag. "Lyn's doing full blood panels. If possible, we need to break down those drugs they'd been injected with."
Juanita came in and handed Melissa a clipboard weighted down with a pile of sheets. "Heart rate, blood pressure, initial reactionary responses all within normal ranges at this point. While we know which drug each man was injected with, the information on the drugs is not available. So, essentially, we've very limited data on what actual chemical composition they were injected with other than the common anesthesia." Juanita tucked her hair behind her ears. "I'll be living here, I can see, to do all this testing."
A ragged snore rattled from one of the cots. Reggie, leaning against a tower of three boxes near Kyle's bed, watched his sister and wondered how well she was holding up. She was now in charge, to an extent, of six male Wielders whom the government had written off as wasted breath.
"Sis, why don't you go home? Get some sleep. Tomorrow might offer new choices."
She closed her eyes for a moment and then opened them. "No sleep for the wicked."
Though bone tired, Reggie gave his sister a quick grin. It's what she used to tell him all those years ago when she raised him from grade school on up. She always worked so hard for him.
Then her face softened, sagging to near desolation as her gaze lingered over all seven of the rescuees. None were paying attention when she mumbled, "What do we do with you?"
"Kyle's with us," August said matter-of-factly. Reggie didn't disagree, though when they had become an 'us', he wasn't quite sure. Or if he was really even included. His stomach soured.
Reggie sized up the people surrounding him. August, confident, ready to speak his mind, in charge of his own wishes. The huddle of kids---three curled up on cots, one spacing out with an utterly blank expression, another's face twisted in despair, one sitting in a chair, leg bouncing in a nervous beat. The women who had come to their salvation, strong yet grim, ready to work against their own government.
"Listen, sis, what is going on? Who took Kyle and these others from the hospital? Was it BWS? Maybe we're paranoid, but is it even safe for us to go back to our houses? They have us on camera, know who August and I are. We don't know if that one woman sent our pictures to anyone from her phone."
"The surveillance was not uploaded remotely, so those images were not leaked," Melissa said, setting her butt down on one of the empty cots. "We'll check their phones. See if we can find the pictures."
The fifth Coalition member walked in, the bushy-haired perky woman who had been helping get the men downstairs at that mansion: Brenda Benson. She'd stripped off her black turtleneck to reveal a simple tank top underneath though the warehouse wasn't warm. "We can run a sweep on social media sites to see if your faces show up." She twisted her curly hair up into a bun at the top of her head. "However, if they've sent them to a private computer, I can't do much about that."
"So," Reggie said, just to clarify, "it is safe for us to go home and back to our jobs."
Brenda nodded, while Jazzy returned and handed thin paper cups of coffee around to those who were not planning on crashing, which pretty much meant the five women. "Though those who were kidnapped," Melissa glanced over at Kyle laying on his cot, his gaze piercing the woman with intense interest, "probably should lie low until we know more about this organization. Kyle, you've escaped from a hospital, a legitimate sentencing for the infraction of Wielding against others and observation for your Taint---"
